After two years of rigorous training, ten Americans officially became astronauts on Tuesday, and are therefore eligible for space missions from NASA, which announced that it will immediately open applications for its next promotion.
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Two UAE citizens who trained alongside them also officially graduated Tuesday at a ceremony in Houston.
Members of the new promotion, called “The flies”, will now be able to be assigned to trips to the International Space Station (ISS), but also to the Moon, as part of the Artemis missions. . And why not even, one day, towards Mars.
“You are here because you are exceptional,” Jim Free, associate administrator at NASA, told them on stage. “You are now ready for a mission. And your missions will change our understanding of Earth and space.”
The ten lucky winners are engineers, scientists, pilots and even doctors, and come from both the army and the civilian world. They were selected in 2021 from more than 12,000 candidates.
They have since undergone intensive training: spacewalk simulations in suits in a huge swimming pool, piloting supersonic planes, survival courses in the cold, Russian lessons and learning how the ISS or the Orion lunar capsule works. ..
New astronaut Chris Birch shared some memories from this period on the microphone, such as the time when, after a week of survival training in a remote area of Alabama, the group found themselves without food and shared “one last bag M&Ms” — peanut treats.
She thanked the instructors, who patiently answered “our never-ending list of ‘what if…’ questions?” on our spacesuits.
“We are ready,” she insisted.
At the same time, NASA announced on Tuesday that it was opening applications for its next promotion. The criteria: be American, with a master’s degree in a scientific, technological or engineering discipline, and have professional experience of at least three years. Or be a doctor or a pilot.
The application period will close on April 2.
